An existing ATHLETE (All-Terrain Hex-Limbed Extra-Terrestrial Explorer) with the proper equipment could harvest lunar dust and repurpose it into any shape at any location

For SinterHab, the baked soil would form a shield over the base to protect it from radiation and micrometeorites

A proposal earlier this year by NASA described creating a solar-powered module that could process regolith and feed it to a robotic arm equipped with a microwave print head

According to A-ETC, a core of five domes could house four to eight people, including space for laboratories

The SinterHab designers claim there would be enough space inside the domes to cultivate gardens as part of a bio-regenerative life support system

A design team of Tomas Rousek, Katarina Eriksson and Dr. Ondrej Doule collaborated with the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory on a possible lunar station located near the Shackleton crater of the moon's south pole

The proposed SinterHab moon base would consist of bubble-like compartments coated in a protective layer of melted lunar dust

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Article Summary

The race to build a manned research station on the moon has been slowly picking up steam in recent years, with several developed nations actively studying a variety of construction methods. In just the past few months, the European Space Agency revealed a design involving 3D-printed structures and the Russian Federal Space Agency announced plans for a moon base by 2037. Now international design agency, Architecture Et Cetera (A-ETC), has thrown its hat into the ring with a proposal for SinterHab, a moon base consisting of bubble-like compartments coated in a protective layer of melted lunar dust.